Why does my lemon tree not produce?

Question

My lemon tree always produced lots of fruit until we placed concrete,and built a patio,my husband left a square on top for sun and placed plastic for sun,but it has not had one fruit or flowers in 2 years,did we kill it or is it because it’s not getting direct sun? We cut it quite a bit to fit the patio,so we thought it would come back,would it help to remove the plastic cover? I water the leaves every day to keep it moist,it rarely rains here and the temp.reaches 120* any suggestions?

Answer 1

You live in a very extreme climate and your lemon tree needs the best of conditions to survive and produce fruit. The radical changes that you have imposed on the growing conditions, plus the pruning and root pruning have undoubtedly had severe physiological stress effects.

Limiting the open soil surface for water and soil fertility management, plus covering the solar access except for a small opening, may be too much. Frankly I would be surprised if it can survive and thrive with the restricted conditions.

The only things I can advise are to water adequately in the available soil space, not just wetting the foliage. Fertilize with a citrus-specific fertilizer, let it grow out some foliage to enhance gathering of all the sunlight that it can for photosynthesis.